[FREE] ConvertWithMoss - convert from/to WAV,Bitwig,SFZ,SF2,DecentSampler,MPC/Force,Wave-/Modwave/KMP,NKI,EXS) v17.1

[martinique]

Awave Studio really needs a macOS version.

It is true... and most importantly with great urgency!!!

[Examigan]

I have a few old soundsets for Wusik that would be cool to convert. I think they’re called VS and OB Resurrection.

[moss]

What is your output folder? Does this message also appear when you do a conversion?

Source and Destination do exist, the paths are simple and short ("E:\Test" for source and "E:\Test-SFZ" for output). The conversion runs without a problem. Here's a gif demonstrating the situation:
ConvertWithMoss-Analyse.gif

This issue has been fixed with v12.1.0 - great!

With v12.2.0, there's now a small UX niggle when using the Analyze feature before executing a conversion. It'll create a log file in the output directory (which I really appreciate). When you then start the conversion, you'll get "The output folder is not empty. Please select an empty folder." because the log file is already in there. Would it be possible to check if the directory only contains the ConvertWithMoss.log and in that case not show the error message?

Yeah, pretty stupid. Will be changed.

[moss]

I reevaluated this conversion with v12.2.0 and a variant of this patch created with Kontakt 3.5.

Point 1 of my original post still applies; the overlapping NN-XT zones don't have the their ALT setting set to true even though the Kontakt 3.5 patch uses round robin settings for those groups.

There's now an additional problem: only samples from Kontakt's first group are converted. Other groups will simply have the first group's samples duplicated. Here's an excerpt from the original sample set: CWM12.2.0-SXT-MissingAndDuplicateSamples-Original.png
And here is an excerpt from the converted NN-XT patch: CWM12.2.0-SXT-MissingAndDuplicateSamples-NN-XT.png

Note how all samples end with 01 in the converted patch while the original patch has other endings like 02 or 03.

The Velocity to Volume influence (point 2) and the Release envelope settings (point 3) are much less off now, but still not exactly what they are in the original patch (12% vel scaling in Kontakt 3.5 vs 8% vel scaling in NN-XT for point 2 and 412ms Release time in K3.5 vs 1.5s Release time in NN-XT for point 3). Some of this could be because NN-XT seems to adjust its settings to perceived timings. My knowledge on this is vague and hearsay. Do you know if those differences are intentional?

Uh, there also was a Kontakt 3.5?
I have not a single file in that format. Can you send me some?
Please PM me (and please add the error description again, makes it easier for me).

[moss]

Hello Moss,
I tried to convert an Akai CD to EXS for LogicPro.
ConvertWithMoss does the conversion but only creates the .wav files and does NOT create the .exs files.

Can you tell me if there's a way or I am doing something wrong? Maybe I need to set something in particular to get those necessary .exs?

Thanks for the suggestions...

> I'm not a programmer, but I believe that the .exs file is nothing more than a file that contains information to be given to LogicPro's ‘Sampler’: where the .wav file is located that it has to associate and load, its position/zones/mapping/performance on the keyboard... (C1, C2 etc.), whether it contains particular time sample loops (to loop the final part of the sound) and so on.

CDXtract used to do all this perfectly but no longer worked on Intel or ARM Macs.
You can download a version here, maybe it could help:
https://www.soundlib.com/cdxtract/

Make sure you did select "Logic EXS24" on the right hand side as the destination format.

[moss]

I knew I know this name... from ChangeIt/JV1080 decades ago. (Still own and use this machine!)

A long time ago in a far away galaxy
Funnily enough I just bought again a JV-1080 recently in mint condition! Love it!

Ok, I just tried ConvertWithMoss 12.2.0 under Linux (opensuse/tumbleweed).
Had to convert the deb with alien, but it worked.
Next idea was to try the deb under Debian Bookworm arm64 on a Zynthian (https://zynthian.org/), alas the deb is - while being java based - amd64 specific. I'll try to build it myself.

Shouldn't be too hard to build it from the sources on GitHub.

However, my target of interest is the Waldorf Blofeld WPC sample format.
As I am on linux only, do you think it might be a higher effort needed to add support for the Waldorf Blofeld?

I can add it to the long list of format wishes but so far you are the only one who requested it.

BTW: Shortcircuit, (mentioned on the first page of this thread) is open sourced and currently worked on by the same team, that also prepared Surge for open source release, find it at https://github.com/surge-synthesizer/shortcircuit-xt.

That's definitively on my list and will revist it as soon as there is a first usable version.

[moss]

Trying to convert from SFZ to MPC keygroups. The samples' loop points are not saving, unfortunately. Anyone confirm it?

Since there is no official documentation of the format, I might be misunderstanding some things but from my tests the attributes "SliceLoopStart", "SliceEnd" and "SliceLoop".
Since "SliceLoop" is set to 0 in your example, there is no loop detected in the source material.
Did you check the SFZ, if the loops are disabled?
If this is not the case, please send me an example (PM me).

[Schrödinger's Cat]

I reevaluated this conversion with v12.2.0 and a variant of this patch created with Kontakt 3.5.

Point 1 of my original post still applies; the overlapping NN-XT zones don't have the their ALT setting set to true even though the Kontakt 3.5 patch uses round robin settings for those groups.

There's now an additional problem: only samples from Kontakt's first group are converted. Other groups will simply have the first group's samples duplicated. Here's an excerpt from the original sample set: CWM12.2.0-SXT-MissingAndDuplicateSamples-Original.png
And here is an excerpt from the converted NN-XT patch: CWM12.2.0-SXT-MissingAndDuplicateSamples-NN-XT.png

Note how all samples end with 01 in the converted patch while the original patch has other endings like 02 or 03.

The Velocity to Volume influence (point 2) and the Release envelope settings (point 3) are much less off now, but still not exactly what they are in the original patch (12% vel scaling in Kontakt 3.5 vs 8% vel scaling in NN-XT for point 2 and 412ms Release time in K3.5 vs 1.5s Release time in NN-XT for point 3). Some of this could be because NN-XT seems to adjust its settings to perceived timings. My knowledge on this is vague and hearsay. Do you know if those differences are intentional?

Uh, there also was a Kontakt 3.5?
I have not a single file in that format. Can you send me some?
Please PM me (and please add the error description again, makes it easier for me).

Done! I found the original Kontakt patch and it was actually made with v2.2.
Kontakt 3.5 was the first 64bit version. That was so liberating.

[martinique]

Make sure you did select "Logic EXS24" on the right hand side as the destination format.

Of course I did it!
I tried a Kontakt NKI > EXS conversion but with no luck... although the function I would love is Akai > EXS (NOT Akai MPC) to convert all my collection of old CD Akai.

Anyway in the ‘ConvertWithMoss.log’ file it says: Desktop/Kontakt NKI > EXS/TAKA FNGR-AS/TAKA FNGR-AS.exs but unfortunately there is no .exs file in there, only wav files.
> It also says: Could not create multi-sample: 0 > -24
Maybe this is the problem?

I would be really surprised if you can get those .exs files.
If so, can you explain step by step how to convert an Akai .iso > .exs?

[moss]

Make sure you did select "Logic EXS24" on the right hand side as the destination format.

Of course I did it!
I tried a Kontakt NKI > EXS conversion but with no luck... although the function I would love is Akai > EXS (NOT Akai MPC) to convert all my collection of old CD Akai.

Anyway in the ‘ConvertWithMoss.log’ file it says: Desktop/Kontakt NKI > EXS/TAKA FNGR-AS/TAKA FNGR-AS.exs but unfortunately there is no .exs file in there, only wav files.
> It also says: Could not create multi-sample: 0 > -24
Maybe this is the problem?

I would be really surprised if you can get those .exs files.
If so, can you explain step by step how to convert an Akai .iso > .exs?

Akai format is not supported. Maybe somewhere in the future.

Please send me one of the NKIs for testing (PM me).

[Hyperbole]

I'm late to the party here. First, thank you moss for creating this very useful conversion utility. I was despairing because I used CDXtract extensively back in the day to convert my 50+ titles of Akai and Roland sample CD-ROMs to EXS and Kontakt formats. I wanted to convert some of these EXS and Kontakt sampled instruments to TAL Sampler and Serum 2 (as SFZ instruments) formats, but as people have mentioned, CDXtract was abandoned a long time ago. And Chicken Systems Translator hasn't been updated in ages (and was always buggy in my experience).

I just used ConvertWithMoss to convert a folder of .exs factory instruments to TAL Sampler format. Everything came across. However, I did notice that some of the loop points are off by 1 sample, thus creating a soft click at the loop end. Also, the left channel was missing in some of the converted instruments.

FYI, I selected the "Sample (unity note, pitch fraction, loops)" option for the "Add or update WAV chunks" settings. Should I select a different option to avoid these issues?

Finally, can HALion (version 7 and later) be added as a destination? Going forward, I plan to use Logic's Autosampler plugin to create multi-sampled / multi-velocity layer sampled instruments for some of my synths without patch storage. However, because I use Cubase Pro as my DAW, I want to convert these .exs instruments to HALion format.

BTW, I realize that HALion can natively import .exs files. However, HALion converts only EXS Groups and not complete instruments. Thus, it's a bit of a pain to import certain .exs sampled instruments into HALion, which is my go-to software sampler these days. Incidentally, I used to use Kontakt as my main software sampler. But I'm not bullish on NI's future and thus don't want to hitch my wagon to Kontakt (which I used begrudgingly anyway, given what I consider its horrible UI).

Although I primarily use UVI's Falcon to play back the 10 or so UVI sample libraries I own, it would be nice if ConvertWithMoss also supported Falcon 3 as a destination format. I do use Falcon from time to time as a "sample-based synthesizer" because it's very powerful (but also suffers from a poor UI, IMO). Thanks!

[Hyperbole]

Is it possible to add AKAI, E-MU, Ensoniq, Roland, ISO, NRG, IMG, support as well?

Sure. But this is a HUGE amount of work. Most of these formats are not publicly documented and it takes a lot of time to decipher them (Weeks, Months, Years). Which is true for the new Logic Sampler as well.

Contributions are always welcome.

Have you considered turning ConvertWithMoss into a commercial product? I would gladly pay $100 for a sample library converter that supports all the main modern software sampler formats and does a good (but not perfect) job of converting their synthesis parameters to the destination format.

In an ideal world, it might be nice to support older hardware sampler CD-ROM formats. But outside of a few diehards who still own hardware samplers for reasons that are lost on me, most of these are dead formats. So, I would focus on the following instead:

Kontakt
EXS (Sampler)
HALion
TAL Sampler
SFZ
SF2

The SFZ and SF2 formats would really just be "interim" formats when going from Kontakt to Serum 2, for instance, (which can import SFZ files but doesn't include any multi-sample recording and keymap editing features).

Of course, it would also be cool if ConvertWithMoss continues to support less widely used formats like Reason's NN-XT. But I wouldn't spend much time matching filter and envelope settings when converting to these less popular software sampler formats.

That's my 2 cents.

[Hyperbole]

Hey Moss,

I checked the EXS instruments I had converted to TAL Sampler format in Logic's Sampler instrument, and none of the loops in the source samples clicked. I tried reconverting the EXS instruments with the "Sample (unity note, pitch fraction, loops)" option unchecked. But this had no effect. These same loops still clicked.

Since TAL Sampler keeps the samples separate from the preset files, I suppose I could open each problematic sample in Wavelab and adjust its loop end point by one or two samples. But that would be a pain, given the number of affected samples. It's not the majority of samples, but enough to be a hassle.

Thanks for your help!

[tedeg]

Hello,
Your software is excellent.. I have problem when nki and ksf are converted to soundfont.
The velocity of converted sounds is inverted do you know this bug?
Friendly teddy

[polypx]

Getting wrong loop points converting SF2 to Kontakt. version 12.2.0
I think it's just setting the loop points to the entire sample..???